Episode 31 is live and ready to be shot into your ear on a rocket sled. In this episode Jeeg, CT and I do a “3 way dance”, ie we fly without a fourth chair and just talk amongst the three of us. Our subject? Life, man. We just sit and talk about life, love and just being alive, my friend.

Just kidding, this isn’t an Oprah podcast. This week we are talking about our own personal Nerd Bucket Lists. You know, the list of things I’d like to do before I die in a hail of gunfire and lightsaber blades.

Actually, CT has deemed it Nerdy Lunchy Buckety List, or something like that. We list things we’d like to do, places we’d like to eat and places we’d like to go before we kick the bucket. We even discuss a few bucket list items we’d like to do before we retire from podcasting in like 50-60 years (trust me, you’ll be stuck with the Nerd Lunch Podcast for a while).

So download this episode and start thinking about your own demise. It’s fun.

Welcome to the big episode #30 extravaganza. In this episode, Jeeg “Bad Attitude” Baracus takes the hosting mic from “Hannibal” CT and joins me, “Howling Mad” Holley, and return guest Rondal “The Faceman” (from Strange Kids Club), as we do a drill down on one of CT’s (and everyone else’s) favorite shows of all time: The A-Team.

We’ll discuss the characters in the show, specific seasons, episodes and guest stars. We’ll discuss ideas we wish the show would have done as well as how we would like to see the A-Team continue on. We’ll also delve into the movie from 2010 and wonder why it won’t be getting an awesome sequel.

So join us for an awesome discussion about one of the quintessentially 80s TV shows.

Here we are, one episode away from #30. This week’s topic came about due to a comment by Jeeg on my Star Wars Episode I in 3D article from back in February. Jeeg wanted to discuss why Star Wars characters like Boba Fett, Darth Maul and Admiral Ackbar are so popular with fans when they do next to nothing in the movie.

It’s a valid question and I think is indicative of sci-fi properties in general, but most noticeably with Star Wars. Join us for a fun Star Wars discussion that delves into not just the movies but the expanded universe of books, comics and yes, we again mention the Holiday Special (it just won’t go away).

Welcome to Episode 14 of the Nerd Lunch Podcast. This week, the podcast is hosted by yours truly and I abuse the powers granted to me by hosting to choose the topic. It is the holiday season so I wanted to do a drilldown on the Star Wars Holiday Special. I also used my hosting power to select our special guest. This week we are joined by long time friend of mine and winner of the Access Hollywood Ultimate Star Wars Fan, Jason Collier.

So amongst grumbling from the Trekkies in the podcast, we all prepared to watch one of the most bootlegged and maligned TV shows of all time.

Come listen to the Nerd Lunch crew run the “nerd marathon” and watch the special and marvel at the cardboard sets, Bea Arthur as a bartender and Chewie’s dad watching Star Wars porn. It’s A-MAZING.

A few years ago I wrote two articles for the Archie McPhee website Monkey Goggles. It was a fun site with quirky humor/pop culture articles and I was glad to contribute. My buddy Shawn over at Branded in the 80s also wrote a few articles for the site. Unfortunately, it seems Monkey Goggles has stopped updating so I thought I’d archive the articles I wrote here before they are swallowed by that unforgiving beast, The Internet.

Anyway, the first article I wrote was about discontinued soda. I published it last week. The second article I wrote was about The Star Wars Holiday Special. The Holiday Special aired for the first time on November 17, 1978, which makes it 33 years old today. I thought reprinting the below article on the TV special’s 33rd birthday was appropriate. And, stay tuned, the Nerd Lunch podcast is going to devote an entire episode to The Holiday Special. That should be coming up in December. I can hardly wait to record it. Until then, enjoy this article.

And I may be biased, but I have to say, this is one of my very favorite articles I’ve ever written.

The Star Wars Holiday Special is legendary amongst Star Wars fans. Created to bridge the gap between the first Star Wars movie in 1977 and its 1980 sequel The Empire Strikes Back, The Holiday Special only aired once in America and immediately rocketed to infamy by being so notoriously bad that it swings back over to good, ninja-kicks it in the groin, leaves good in a crumpled heap, and moves all the way back into shockingly horrible. To sit and watch the two hours of boring insanity contained within the Holiday Special is like an endurance trial for hardcore Star Wars fans. The awkwardly-inserted musical numbers and endlessly boring live-action scenes combine to create a perfect storm of awfulness.

Not surprisingly, George Lucas hates The Holiday Special. And by “hates it,” I mean that Lucas once said that if he had the time, he would find every copy of it in existence and smash it with a sledgehammer. Lucasfilm doesn’t officially comment or discuss the special, as if by pretending it doesn’t exist will cause all of us to forget it ever happened. But we will always remember, George.

The Holiday Special turned 31 years old last November, so I decided to celebrate the anniversary by taking at look at some of the rarest of “Star Wars” collectibles — those based on the Holiday Special. There was a big marketing push before the special aired back in 1978, but after it died its fiery, televised death, Lucasfilm pretty much cut it loose and left it to die like a gutted Tauntaun. As a result of this abandonment, the spectrum of Holiday Special collectibles is very small. Let’s take a look at some of the items one would look for if they wanted to collect merchandise pertaining to one of the most reviled television specials in history.

Like most films, the Holiday Special was preceded by a press kit (left). It’s a package of information that was sent out to newspapers and television stations to promote the airing of the upcoming special. The official Star Wars Holiday Special press kit contained a booklet, several black and white stills, production information and a mini-poster, all contained in a silver folder. Since press kits are meant for media only, complete sets of these can be very hard to find and only a few complete copies are known to exist.

If you can actually sit through the Holiday Special and not doze off or throw your 12″ Boba Fett through the TV in utter rage, you’ll be treated to an appearance by Jefferson Starship for no other reason than “why the hell not?” The song the band performs, Light the Sky on Fire, was released as a 45″ single and the record sleeve mentions the song’s appearance on The Star Wars Holiday Special as if that somehow gives the even-then aging rockers street cred. The B-side? A song called Hyperdrive that wasn’t used in the special but probably could have been had the producers hated their audience just a little bit more. Diahann Carroll also performed in the Holiday Special, but smartly decided not to ever mention her connection to the show.

The January 1979 issue of Starlog (right) actually featured the Holiday Special on its cover, and inexplicably chose to use a picture of Bea Arthur and a bunch of cantina aliens on the cover instead of Han or Chewie or Luke or, God forbid, Chewie’s family. I mean, you are doing a cover story on the first new Star Wars in over a year and a half and you choose Bea Arthur? It’s like going with a story on a new “Godfather” movie and using Moe Green on the cover. Was Starlog trying to jinx everything? From now on, Starlog, I lay the blame for this entire Holiday Special fiasco at your doorstep.

I discussed the 15th anniversary of Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire on Tuesday. In that article I mentioned that a set of trading cards was created for that event featuring awesome artwork by the Brothers Hildebrandt. I want to look at the paintings that made up this set.

You get a great look at the creation of these paintings in this book:

The above book goes into a fair amount of detail about the Hildebrandt creative process. It’s fascinating. The book mostly covers the creation of the paintings for the Shadows of the Empire card set. But it provides a lot of information about that set. It’s a really good read.

Now let’s take a look at some of my favorite of these Shadows of the Empire paintings.

These are the heroes of the book; Luke, Leia, Lando and Chewie. I created a custom Jedi Luke figure based on the Shadows of the Empire book cover. See that figure and card here.

This is Boba Fett going toe-to-toe with Dengar and Bossk over the frozen Capt Solo. This actually happened in the comic book, not the novel.

Here’s a new character created for the book, Guri. She’s the android bodyguard of Prince Xizor, ruler of Black Sun, who is also a new character.

Well, Toy Fair in New York was this past weekend. There were tons of toy reveals going on for all types of toys and games, but one piece of news actually has me giddy as a schoolgirl at a Jonas Brothers concert.

Hasbro announced that for The Empire Strikes Back’s 30th anniversary this year, they are bringing the Vintage Original Trilogy Collection back. Hasbro started the Vintage Original Trilogy Collection (OTC) back in 2004 (see pics here). It consisted of mostly movie based figures in “vintage style” packaging reminiscent of the Kenner figures in the early 1980s. The vintage packaging for these new figures looks fantastic but the best news about this vintage set is that if you buy five figures, you can send away for a rocket firing Boba Fett!!

Why is this fantastic news? Well, for those that don’t know, back in the day, right before Empire Strikes Back came out (pre-1980), Star Wars figures had a mail away offer for an exclusive Boba Fett with a rocket firing backpack. It was a way for Kenner to promote the new movie before it was released. Here’s an advertisement showcasing this mail away toy offer (via my Flickr buddy Jason Liebig):